Screens
by Leather Sky
Summary: What starts out as Minato's harmless hobby gradually degenerates into something not so harmless as his actions begin to have worse and worse consequences. Completed.
1. Prologue

**Prologue**

Minato looked down at Mitsuru curiously, wondering why she thought he'd be able to do anything with the console in the Chairman's office. He couldn't recall ever claiming to be a mechanical genius. But, he respected Mitsuru so if she thought he could be of some help, he could at least try. He nodded and told her he would have a look at it.

The late afternoon sunlight caught the dust motes in the office and made them shift and float in strange suggestive patterns that vanished as soon as they were formed. The spines on the many books all held imposing titles. Minato walked past them and sat down in one of the chairs by the console. He didn't really even know what he was looking for. Cautiously, he tried a few controls that didn't look like they would do anything catastrophic. Then something came on the screen all of a sudden, asking him if he wanted to view a recording.

Everything that was to happen later had its genesis in that moment.

At first, Minato would just go back and check the recordings every once in awhile. The computer picked up innocent things…trivial things. The Chairman thinking up horrible jokes. Yukari playing with a maid outfit. Junpei horrified to see Mitsuru and Officer Kurosawa in his room. He saw Shinjiro's hidden kindness and Akihiko's insecurities. He watched Fuuka wrestle with one of Tanaka's bogus products and Ken practice with a mop. But when he saw a recording of Mitsuru walking around her room in a towel, still wet from her shower, he started to wonder…

…_what if I could see more?_

Now he began to really study the machine. It clearly had recording capabilities. He thought about just setting it to record nonstop and direct it to store the data somewhere it wouldn't be noticed, but he supposed it would use up a lot of space that way and that _would_ be noticed. That left another option.

He could watch things as they were happening.

That way was risky, too; someone could come in while he was doing it, after all. But after going back and forth on it, he knew he couldn't just let it go. It wasn't just titillation, it was the way he felt seeing the secret sides of everyone, the things they didn't want the others to know. He had eaten from the tree of knowledge and now he couldn't go back. And so, one night after they had all returned from Tartarus, Minato waited…and then he silently crept up to the Chairman's Office.

He didn't turn on any lights. The screen, the only glow in the room, faintly illuminated his face with blue. One by one, he pulled up his friends' rooms, feeling a sense of power from knowing who was sleeping and who couldn't. Little by little, they all began to reveal themselves to him.

And Minato…watched.


	2. Night One

Tonight Minato had gone up relatively early because he wanted to watch Mitsuru. He had gotten to look forward to the nights that he could watch her get ready for bed. As he sat back in the chair he glanced at his wrist watch. He still had a few minutes before she was due to start her nightly routine. (Mitsuru was even rigid about some things when no one was watching.) For something to do, he flipped through the other rooms one by one.

He started on the boys' floor and went up since he would be ending on the girls' floor. His room was empty, of course. So was Akihiko's. Ken was watching television in his room. Minato watched with him. He smiled as Featherman R destroyed another round of fanciful enemies and then flipped over to Junpei's room. Junpei was locking his door. By this time Minato was familiar with what that meant. He zoomed in to see which magazine Junpei was going to use tonight. After that he went on to Shinjiro's room, since he had no particular desire to watch what would happen once Junpei got into bed.

Shinjiro and Akihiko were fighting. He could have flicked on the volume but there was no need. He watched their mouths and their angry expressions for awhile and then pulled up Yukari's room. She was sitting on the edge of her bed, trying to read. She must have had something on her mind though, since she had to keep turning the page back to reread it. Finally she set the book down and rubbed her forehead. Minato watched her look up for a moment and was intrigued by the strained expression on her face. Then he looked in on Fuuka.

Fuuka was in her nightclothes but she was still surfing on her laptop. Minato had to mess with the camera for awhile but he was finally able to make out the screen. She had a chat window open along with a few browser tabs (mostly recipes) and was busy talking to someone. As Minato watched, Fuuka typed, "What did it feel like?"

He glanced at his watch again. It was time now. He switched over to Mitsuru's room and toggled his vantage point until it was overlooking her vanity. He didn't have long to wait before she came and sat down in front of the mirror.

She always got into her nightgown before she started to brush her hair. Minato supposed it might be so she wouldn't get the strands on her clothes. She would always brush carefully, counting until she had reached one hundred. He watched her lips in the mirror as they barely moved, forming the numbers. Even with her makeup off they were full. Then she would plait her hair up for bed, the source, he guessed, of the slight waves it held during the rest of the day. He never got tired of watching those long slender fingers as they flashed palely in and out of the dark red of her hair.

After she was done she would take one last look at herself, scrutinizing, and she would always frown. Minato wondered what it was about herself that she was sizing up so harshly. Was it her mere appearance, or was it something underneath it that she was so dissatisfied with? Regardless, he thought, she was unjustified. But it did go a long way in explaining why she held everyone else to such high standards.

She went to bed and Minato restlessly flipped back through the rest of the rooms in succession. Fuuka shut her laptop. Yukari turned in her uneasy sleep. Akihiko slammed Shinjiro's door violently and Ken jumped in his room. Junpei was just finishing up; Minato watched him stretch and look over at his wall, obviously unsure if he'd heard something.

Minato looked at his own bed for a moment and decided he'd like to be in it. He shut everything off and cautiously went back to his room.


	3. Night Two

It was awhile before he could really get up to the control room again. Things were getting more and more heated for them all both at school and in their secret war. He ended up having to wait several days for his next opportunity. When he finally got another chance it was in the early evening, when there was more of a risk.

It also meant there were less people in their rooms. He knew who had been in the lobby when he left it, so he discounted those rooms immediately. He watched Fuuka for awhile first. This time she was typing, "I'm sure he must just be busy."

Whoever she was chatting with took a moment before replying. "I don't know…I can't help thinking that he got what he wanted and now he doesn't care."

Fuuka kept typing reassuring things, but Minato could see the expression her friend couldn't. Fuuka knew just as well as her friend did that she wouldn't be seeing that boy anymore. Finally, her friend sent the message, "I don't wanna talk about it anymore…tell me who you like."

Fuuka wrinkled her brow and abruptly got up. She walked around her room a couple of times before she sat back down at her laptop and hesitantly typed out a name. Minato was startled as he read it.

"Oh, I think I've seen him around." It was then that Minato guessed that _**ganguro818**_ must be Natsume or Natsuki or whatever her name was. The next line was, "What do you like about him?" and Minato hastily flipped to another room. He felt guilty (and a little shaken) and was on the verge of calling it off for the night. As he was about to switch off the screen, though, he ended up glancing up again.

Junpei was leaned back against his bed sitting surprisingly still. He was fingering something; after a minute Minato realized it was a somewhat battered catcher's mitt. It looked too small for Junpei's hand, like maybe he'd gotten it when he was a lot younger. As Minato watched, Junpei started to pick apart the leather stitching. He got about halfway through and then threw the mitt back toward the closet without looking at it. The volume was on, and as Junpei turned and dug around for his video game controller Minato thought he heard him say, "I'm not keeping it because I miss you."

Minato hesitated for awhile but then he finally switched over to the last room he knew might be occupied. As it turned out, he was right. He watched as Shinjiro silently rolled a small capsule back and forth on his otherwise bare desk before cursing and smashing it with his fist. Minato let the screen go dark with the press of a button.

The next day, Minato said he felt restless and asked Junpei if he wanted to go play ball.


	4. Night Three

Minato went back and forth in his mind on whether he should approach Fuuka, but he finally decided there was no reason not to. He told himself that, if anything, he was doing the right thing since he knew Fuuka was too shy to come to him. Surely it didn't really matter how he had found out about her feelings, as long as they were meant to be together?

With his new interest, it was awhile before he went back to the Chairman's room. In the meantime, more things happened…and they all lost a friend. He didn't really know if that sudden harsh sense of mortality was what made him start to get bored, or if he had been wrong to act in the first place, but things with Fuuka didn't work out the way he had planned. It was on a cold and moonless night that he climbed the steps to the fourth floor once more and sat in that chair.

He decided to hit a random room and go from there. Yukari…she had Koromaru with her and was petting him. As he watched she leaned her face against his side and shut her eyes, holding him tightly. Koromaru stoically allowed it, even though it looked like she was probably hurting him. Her shoulders shook a little. Minato couldn't see her face now…the dog's coat obscured it.

He pulled up a new screen. Mitsuru. She was sitting at her desk, writing something. After awhile she reached for a glass at her elbow. She started to drink it and then realized it was empty.

Junpei. Junpei was sleeping. Why wasn't anyone doing anything worth watching tonight? In his irritation Minato hit the wrong key and Shinjiro's room popped up. It was empty now, of course, except for a single pathetic cardboard box. Minato's hand moved to change rooms and then stopped, hovering over the keyboard. Shinjiro's door was opening.

Akihiko came in, shutting the door behind him as an afterthought. He slowly walked over to the box and then stood there motionlessly for awhile. Minato remembered doing the same thing. He had run his hands over the few things his friend had left behind and felt the sense of loss really hit him for the first time. It wasn't that the sorrow hadn't been real before, but somehow that was the first time Minato had finally felt the certainty that Shinjiro wasn't coming back through that door again, ever. He wondered now if Akihiko were thinking the same thing.

Akihiko finally stirred and drew something from the box. Minato leaned forward in his chair and tried to make out what it was. Shinjiro's Evoker.

Minato's jaw set as he wondered what Akihiko wanted _that_ for. He was pretty sure it had been deactivated, and besides if Akihiko wanted a memento surely there were more personal things in the box. His thoughts were interrupted by the soft sound of a door shutting off-screen. Akihiko must have gone back to his room.

Minato flipped over to Akihiko's room and watched him enter and sit down at his desk. On an impulse, he turned up the volume. For a long time Akihiko didn't do anything but turn the Evoker over in his hands. Minato was just about to give up on him when he heard him start to speak softly.

"Hello, everyone." Akihiko wasn't looking anywhere in particular and the effect was disconcerting. He lifted the Evoker. "Shinji…Miki, Mom, Dad, hello." He held it lightly against one of his temples as he spoke. "How is it up there?" He closed his eyes. "I guess it's pretty great since you all decided to go there."

Minato felt cold all over. Should he give everything away and just rush down there? But Akihiko was speaking again and Minato was paralyzed by his desire to keep watching.

"You know," Akihiko was saying quietly, "Most of the time I'm fine." Then he pulled the trigger. Minato jumped back and then cringed as his chair went crashing to the floor behind him. Fortunately for him the carpet absorbed most of the noise. As he was putting his chair back he saw Akihiko set the Evoker down and then lay his head on his desk a moment later. "Most of the time…I'm fine." His eyes were dry.

Minato felt stupid. He didn't know why he'd been so disturbed, nothing had even happened. Akihiko's persona hadn't even materialized. There had just been a click and that was it. All the same, he knew he'd just watched something he should never have seen. He had already made one mistake with Fuuka, and now this. He swore to himself that tonight was the last night.

It wasn't a week before he was back in the chair.


	5. Day Four

Mitsuru was brushing her hair. _Twenty-six, twenty-seven, twenty-eight. _She was getting to bed very late. They had already been to Tartarus and back and it had been a very long, arduous run. _Forty-three, forty-four, forty-five_. Her face was worried and thoughtful in the mirror. Ken had fallen once and she had needed to revive him, and she was concerned about the damage Aigis had sustained as well. She was thinking about asking Minato to speak to Officer Kurosawa about some upgrades. _Sixty-one, sixty-two, sixty-three._

Minato rubbed his chin and reached over to adjust the camera angle. It gave him a little trouble and so he didn't notice the momentary shift of light in the upper right-hand corner of the mirror, or the way Mitsuru's shoulders stiffened immediately afterwards. By the time he looked back at the screen with his full concentration she was slowly brushing her hair again. _Fifty-nine…sixty, sixty one… _Minato thought offhandedly that she'd been at it a long time and wondered if she'd lost count.

He ran through the other rooms after she went to bed but didn't see anything terribly interesting. Aigis was "awake" but she was maintaining her joints and somehow he felt a little strange watching her tightening the bolts on her arm. Everyone else was already fast asleep. He decided to follow their example.

The next day after he got back from school he decided to try again. He told himself that it was because last night had been relatively boring, and not because this was becoming some kind of compulsion. He had plenty of other interests, after all. As he climbed the steps to the fourth floor he promised himself that he would go out later in the evening. All he wanted now was a quick look.

He felt a little foolish as he started flipping through the rooms, though. A lot of his friends weren't back from school yet, it seemed. Yukari was probably still at Archery Club…Fuuka's room he tended to pass over lately because it made him feel guilty now to look in on her. Mitsuru's room was empty…so was Akihiko's. More in the interest of completion than out of any sense of curiosity, he glanced at Junpei's room.

Junpei and Mitsuru were there.

Minato's eyes widened and he zoomed in. Mitsuru was saying something. He fumbled for the volume.

"There's a short story by Kafka called _In The Penal Colony_…are you familiar with it?"

Junpei looked confused and frightened. Minato wondered why. "Um…literature never really was my strong point…" Junpei retreated a step as Mitsuru took a step towards him.

She paused and took something out of her pocket…Minato squinted and could just make out that it was a tube of lipstick. "In the story…prisoners are executed in a very creative way. The condemned man has his crimes tattooed on his back. The process takes hours…and somewhere shortly before the criminal dies, he always comes to understand the words written into his skin. Take off your shirt."

"Hold on! I still don't get what this is about!"

Mitsuru tapped her foot impatiently. Her arms were crossed over her chest in a very characteristic way. "I won't ask you twice, Iori."

"But…I mean, before I at least knew why I was being Executed…this is…"

"_**Off!**_" Mitsuru was clearly very upset about something. The force of her voice was apparently enough to make Junpei concede to her request. The shirt came off and Mitsuru roughly turned him to face the wall. As Junpei placed his hands against it, Minato frowned and hovered his finger over the button that would cut the feed. Somehow…he didn't press it.

Instead he watched as Mitsuru carefully wrote a word on Junpei's back with her lipstick. He saw Junpei frowning and trying to make out the word from her movements, just like a prisoner from the story. He saw Mitsuru undo her belt and double it up in her hand.

Minato's mouth dropped open and stayed that way until he noticed the cold air on his teeth and shut it. He had never done anything to upset Mitsuru enough to merit "Execution," so he had never known what it was like. As he watched in horror, the character written on Junpei's back slowly lost it's shape from repeated impacts of the belt. Somewhere in the process Junpei's hat tumbled off and he replaced it with his hands, holding them over the back of his head in a desperate attempt at preservation. Minato was very glad that Junpei's face was pressed to the wall where he couldn't see it.

Finally, Mitsuru stopped. She hadn't made a sound the entire time. If Minato had ever wondered if she took pleasure in Executing people, he knew now that she didn't. Her face was pale and her expression strained. She put a hand on Junpei's shoulder and told him it was over. He sank to his knees without looking at her.

Her voice held a queer note of gentleness as she said quietly, "You know now that what you did was wrong. You won't go up there anymore…will you?"

Junpei took a full minute before he replied…or even moved. Finally, he turned partway and faced her, wiping his eyes and nose roughly on the back of his forearm before he spoke. "I told you…_I don't know what you're talking about_." In spite of the pain he had been through he looked defiant and a little angry.

For the first time Mitsuru's confidence seemed to ebb. "Junpei, you…you really don't…know?"

Junpei shook his head slowly and closed his eyes.

Mitsuru stood stock-still. "Oh God. Then…" She knelt in front of Junpei and hugged him to her. If possible Minato was even more shocked by this act than by the terrible scene of violence that had preceded it. She put her hand on the back of his head and said, "I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry…"

What Junpei did next was impressive. He slowly lifted a hand and put it on Mitsuru's arm. "…it's okay. I…I'll probably do something to deserve it next week, or something…Mitsuru-senpai?"

She didn't answer.

"Mitsuru-senpai? Hey…stop crying."

Minato switched it off then. His hands were shaking a little and he felt physically sick. The character on Junpei's back had read, "Spy."


	6. Static

Minato avoided the room after that. He had always thought that what his friends didn't know, wouldn't hurt them, but his closest friend had just taken a _beating_ for him. Not only that, Mitsuru might be watching now to see who was going up there. He had no idea if she had realized it was him yet. Part of Minato wanted to go confess to her, but ultimately he couldn't bring himself to do it. He was almost certain she had assumed it was Junpei because he was the dorm "pervert" as far as she and the other girls were concerned. Somehow, he couldn't bear it if she thought of him in the same way.

A couple of strained days passed. Minato lived in fear of giving himself away. He spent as much time as possible seeing people after school or participating in club activities. That put him in closer contact with Fuuka again and he was relieved to find that they could be good friends after all. Junpei was his usual cheerful self, too. As unlikely as it seemed, Minato concluded that he really must be used to "executions." Maybe there had been no lasting damage. Maybe…everything was going to be okay.

One night, after he had finally persuaded himself that things were back to normal, it all came crashing down.

He was crossing the lobby as usual, on the way to his room to do some studying, when there was a soft tug at his sleeve. He looked down to see Mitsuru sitting there.

"It seems that something's wrong with the console in the Chairman's room again. Could you go take a look at it?"

Minato fought to maintain his calm as he studied her face. It was impassive. There was nothing in her expression to suggest that she suspected anything at all. Maybe Mitsuru had decided she was wrong. Minato realized he had been standing there all this time without speaking and hastily nodded, saying he would go check it out.

Up in the control room the screen had a message for him: there was a new recording. Minato's eyebrows rose as he saw that it was from last night. That was unusual, he thought. It had been at least a month since the last random recording. He had assumed the glitch had either been ironed out somehow, or halted by his own activities on the computer. But, he reflected, you never knew with machines. As a matter of routine he opened the recording.

Akihiko's room. He had apparently been studying at his desk and fallen asleep. His head was on his open notebook and a pen had rolled a little distance away from his right hand. Minato smiled and moved to stop the recording and clear it out. Then he froze.

Mitsuru came in quietly and shut the door. Then she very deliberately locked it. Minato felt a sense of panic well up within him. Should he have gone to Mitsuru after all? Surely she didn't think _Akihiko_ would ever do anything like that. Then he reminded himself that this had all happened last night, and that Akihiko had looked fine when he saw him earlier in the lobby. Still…that didn't necessarily mean anything.

Mitsuru wore the same strained expression she had shone earlier with Junpei, and Minato's sense of uneasiness heightened. He watched as she took a deep breath and squared her shoulders, then walked over to Akihiko and gently roused him. He hesitatingly turned up the volume but kept his hand ready to shut off the feed. If they were just going to have an innocent conversation, he shouldn't watch. He just wanted to be sure nothing bad had happened to Akihiko because of him. If it didn't look like anything had, he would stop watching.

Akihiko took a minute or two to wake up. Minato wondered offhandedly if he was always like that. It would be pretty funny if their school's star boxer had to drag himself out of bed every morning to go train. Somehow Minato had always pictured him bounding out of bed the second the alarm went off. Mitsuru was patient with him, though. She needed to be, since even after Akihiko woke up a little more he was clearly confused by her presence in his room.

"Mitsuru…?" Suddenly Akihiko's eyes opened all the way and he shot up out of his chair, making Mitsuru jump a little. "What's wrong? Is it a Shadow?" As he spoke his hand automatically went for the right-hand drawer.

Mitsuru smiled…a little. "It's not." Then, with the same tone that a mother might use when her child goes around touching everything in a department store, she said, "Put that down."

Akihiko slowly put down his Evoker and then asked, "Why are you here, then?"

He wasn't prepared for her answer, though. Neither was Minato. With the same sense of purpose Minato had witnessed earlier, Mitsuru pulled Akihiko's face down to hers and began to kiss him violently. She backed him relentlessly towards the bed, and as Minato watched what happened after that several parallels flashed through his mind. He thought of a citadel being conquered. He thought of a valkyrie dragging a warrior up to Valhalla. But mostly Minato thought of how Akihiko was experiencing everything with Mitsuru that he had only dreamed about. Watching this wasn't arousing…it was painful.

After it had begun Minato was so numb that he didn't even think of switching it off. He watched as Akihiko, exhausted, finally fell back and he saw the gentle way Mitsuru passed her hand over his eyes, shutting them.

"Now…go back to sleep."

It was only after she said those words that Minato thought to switch off the feed. He did so and then covered his own eyes. He was still sitting hunched over the darkened screen when he heard the door behind him open and then shut softly. By that point, though, he was beyond the fear of discovery. He did nothing.

"I hope you understand why I had to do that." It was Mitsuru's voice. There was something jarring about hearing it in this room with him after hearing it on the recording.

Minato turned around in his chair and looked up at her, shaken. "Then…that was on purpose?"

She nodded gravely. "Of course. You watched us all without our consent. That was wrong. I suspected Iori and acted thoughtlessly…another consequence of what you did. You had to be punished." Her face betrayed a hint of sadness. "And so did I."

Minato felt dead inside as the meaning of her words struck him. "Are you saying…that if I hadn't…watched you, you might have…"

Mitsuru smiled softly. "I think we both know it's useless to dwell on what 'might have been.'"

Minato's face fell and he leaned forward to say something, _anything_ to change her mind, or even just to apologize, but she had turned and was walking away again.

"I don't believe that any further action is necessary. This room will be locked from tomorrow on." She inclined her head just slightly to look back at him. "Good night." The door shut behind her.

That night, as Minato lay in bed trying to sleep, he shut his eyes and remembered the image of long, slender fingers…flashing palely in and out of the dark red of her hair.


End file.
